BACH The Cello Suites / Jian Wang | Decca Classics

As its first album since its launch on 15 May, 2025, the newly founded label Deutsche Grammophon China (DG China), a collaboration with Universal Music Greater China, will release the album ‘Bach: The Cello Suites’ performed by Jian Wang on 23 May. 

After two decades, internationally acclaimed cellist Jian Wang returns to one of the greatest solo works in classical music history – the Cello Suites by Johann Sebastian Bach. Captured in the Opera House of the Shanghai Conservatory, produced by a world-class team including Grammy Award-winning engineer Rainer Maillard and mastered by the world-renowned Emil Berliner Studios in Berlin, this new album reflects two decades of artistic evolution, marking Jian Wang’s second complete recording of Bach’s Cello Suites since 2004. 

This new interpretation emphasizes the dance character of the music, with more elastic phrasing, direct articulation, and a leaner aesthetic, contrasting with the lyricism of 20 years ago. Jian Wang notes, “Music isn’t a technical showcase—it’s about spiritual resonance. Bach’s music is like a mirror: it reflects the performer’s aesthetics, but also exposes their limits. That’s what makes it so great.”

From the quietly luminous Prelude of Suite No. 1 to the transcendental stillness of the Sarabandes, every movement carries the imprint of a lifetime’s dialogue with Bach. Wang continues: “If someone listening to my playing hears not just Bach’s heartbeat, but also the tremble of their own inner world — that would be the most precious response I could hope for.

“Bach’s Cello Suites have been the most important works in my life as a cellist. Over the past two decades, I have approached them with deep reverence, constantly exploring new interpretations and artistic insights. On the 20th anniversary of my previous recording on Deutsche Grammophon, I felt a profound urge to revisit these masterpieces — to document my evolving understanding and reflections in a new rendition. I am truly grateful to DG China for supporting this project.”

Listen to a pre-release track of the first movement prelude from the 1st suite.